We got full custody of my step-daughter 3 years ago this month. She went from spending 4-6 days a months with us to full-time 24/7/365. She came to visit for Thanksgiving and just never left. The timing was hard – we found out we got custody of her the same week I found out that I was pregnant with the twins and 5 months before I defended my PhD.

I was overwhelmed and hormonal. I was miserable. I felt like a terrible person. I knew taking custody of her was the right thing to do, of course. She was in terrible danger with her mom. But I was finally, FINALLY pregnant and I wanted my little family – the family I had imagined in my head. That family picture didn’t include an emotionally damaged, spoiled, full-time step-kid. I know, it makes me sound awful. It was awful – I was awful. (I obviously never let her know that I felt like that.) I spent days locked in my closet crying. It’s a big deal to go from not having a kid to always having a kid. And I love my husband but he’s not a hands on father – all of the parenting and child care fell to me. I was overwhelmed. And the guilt was overwhelming. Here was this 8-year-old kid who had just been through hell and then been taken away from her mom and she was fine. I was 37 and was losing my shit. What kind of parent was I? Did this mean I was a crappy mother and that’s why I was infertile?

Fast forward to today. I just got a text from her – “Hey mama W, can we watch a scary movie tonight after daddy and the boys go to bed? I’ll make popcorn! I love you”. Last night we spent an hour on the couch together and she learned to french braid using my hair and YouTube. She’s my go to now for good road trip music. We make dinner together almost every night, and when she had an assignment at school about what makes her happy one of the things she said was “cooking dinner with W”. I help her with her math homework and we have long involved discussions about which house we would be sorted into if we went to Hogwarts. I miss her when she goes to see her mom. I can’t imagine life with out her. And I don’t want to.

I bring this up because after getting her text I googled “good relationship with step-mom”. All I got was how-to articles and articles about why step-mothers and daughters have such terrible relationships. Every google search I could think of turned up only negative results. “Why step-daughters and step-monsters can never get along”; “How to make the best of your step relationship.” – all bad news. But you know what? It’s not bad. We have a great relationship now. I love her. She’s my kid. She’s an integral part of my family. It was hard work to get here – there was a lot of intentional parenting, lots of fits and starts and good and bad choices, and we both worked really hard at it. And it was worth it.

I took her to her middle school orientation a few months ago. She introduced me to her science teach and said “This is my parent, W,” and he said “Don’t you mean your mom?” and she said “No. A mom loves you and gives birth to you but a parent is the person who takes care of you.” And there you have it.

**I need to amend this post based on a thoughtful comment from a fellow infertile step-mom. Not every step-family is harmonious, even after a lot of work and effort and love, and there can be lots of different reasons for that. Some things can be fixed and some things can’t. Do the best you can, love as hard as you can and realize that you can only do so much. As step-parents the deck is stacked against us and sometimes there’s no recovering from that. All you can do is your best. Much love to you, fellow step-parents.

I’m going to try to be as honest about this as I can, which is going to be hard because it doesn’t cast me in a very good light. I know the things I’m going to say will make me seem selfish and petty. And the truth is there are great parts to being a step-mother, lots and lots of wonderful parts. But so far there are no easy parts to being an infertile step-mother.

First, a little background. I met the girl who would become my step-daughter after her dad and I had been dating for 6 months. She was 4 1/2 then, and she’ll turn 8 this May. I truly do love her. She’s a good kid – bright, sweet, energetic and funny. Her mother has issues with drugs and alcohol and has recently been diagnosed with a (treatable) mental illness. She is very disruptive in our lives on a daily basis, even when we don’t have the child.

We discovered that I have DOR in April, and as of Dec my AMH has fallen to the point where it’s unlikely I’ll ever have children of my own.

Anyway, we have my stepdaughter every weekend as well as every holiday and all summer. Here are the problems –

I know that she isn’t mine. Implicit in that is the fact that she could be removed from my life at any time, and I would have no recourse. To make matters worse her mother tells her things like “You don’t have to listen to her, she’s not your real family.”

She hasn’t been raised the way I would raise a child. She is sweet by nature and that’s her saving grace, because she has been spoiled and babied by everyone in her life. When she is with us over the summer we have structure, routine and rules. However, rules are very difficult to keep when we only have her part-time, when her father is overwhelmed with guilt because of the divorce and thus caves to every demand, and when her mother tells her she “is a precious angel who never should have to lift a finger for her evil step-mother”. (Literally, she said that word for word) *eye roll*

She is a constant reminder of all I want and can’t have, as well as a reminder that another woman (and a very difficult woman) was able to give my husband something that I never will be able to give him.

The first two points I can deal with. We’re working on her behavior (which is not her fault, she’s a child. It’s the fault of the adults in her life) and I’m working hard to build a relationship with her that will endure regardless. But I can’t get past point 3.

Some days are fine. And there are some days when I’m really low and feeling beaten down by the whole infertility process and I just can’t be around her. I see her and I’m angry and jealous and envious and sad. I’m angry because my husband doesn’t fully understand how hard it is for me because, as he says when he’s trying to comfort me, “He already has A”. I’m jealous that this hateful, mean, spiteful woman was able to have a child and I can’t. And she doesn’t nurture her, or protect her, or set a good example for her. She exposes her to dangerous people and situations. She uses her as a bargaining chip – self proclaimed “leverage” both with us and with all other involved parties (grandparents, aunts, etc). And I’m angry at myself, because here is a child in my life (and all I want is a child) and I can’t just be grateful. I want her to be enough, and she’s not. And that makes me feel like a terrible person. A hateful, mean, bitter person.

I do my best to never, by word or deed, let her know how I feel. I try to be understanding about my husbands guilt, her mother’s mental illness, the difficult situation we are all in. I try to be a good example, a good influence, a positive force in her life. I try to be gentle with myself – to allow myself the bad feelings for a time and then put them aside. And it wears me out. The honest to god truth, and perhaps the moral of this story, is that it is very difficult to care for someone else’s child when you’re mourning the loss of your own.

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